Page 51 of Drawn by Dragonblood (Blood Born #1)

Dakota

T he revelation that the paranormal wasn’t fiction made my head spin.

And the ease with which Jon submitted to what Elijah called being fated mates almost knocked my feet from beneath me.

I wanted to pinch myself but couldn’t release my hold on Jon’s hand or Elijah’s fist as a wave of emotions far beyond my own trickled through my mind.

Heartache, love, unbelievable joy, trust…

all radiating through the tenuous bond I felt through touching them both.

I stared at Elijah’s ex-lover, the one who had broken his heart in order to search out their female and had ended up alone because he couldn’t be patient and wait for his own destiny.

Believing in fate also meant he had to leave the White Mountains so that Elijah could find the two who belonged to him as he’d declared Jon and I did.

My emotions tumbled over the more muffled ones from both Jon and Elijah—for I was sure the circle my husband created had somehow swept away the veil that kept us from connecting completely.

As for Dolyn, although his close proximity didn’t pull on me like it had the first time, his presence alone still drew me in with more strength than any other face I’d caught on camera and tucked away in my strange file.

He claimed to be the only other dragonblood.

Perhaps…

“Dolyn,” I whispered, breaking the stillness among the four of us.

His gaze swung my way, and he didn’t bother hiding the disgust from his eyes. Darkness swirled in his pupils, same as I’d seen in Elijah while in the basement—the beast within.

Half-giddy over the reminder I lived a real-life fairytale, I considered pinching myself again but knew without doubt I would feel the pain if I did. “There are more of us than you believe.”

He scoffed, massive arms crossing over his chest, but I wasn’t interested in drinking in the sight of how his muscles popped in a show of strength. Facade, I realized, not confidence. The man hurt, suffered already, for the choice he’d made in abandoning Elijah. “And you know this how ?”

“I—” I blew a breath from my lips. “I’m drawn to some people, like we connected in a past life or something. It’s like if I look long enough, focus harder, that I might see them—what and who they are inside.”

His lip curled as he glanced down over my body. “Elijah claims a ‘mere drop’ of dragonblood flows in your veins, and you believe that’s enough to give you one of the gifts of our kind?”

“Gifts?”

“Mythical abilities long before my parents’ time,” Elijah said, but his voice didn’t hold the disbelief Dolan’s did. His fist relaxed beneath my hold.

Me—us.

I blinked at the voice in my head, the soft words bringing clarity to my mind of what I truly was. I no longer had to submit myself to guilt, that the draw toward others in my heart was cheating in some way.

I held the power within myself to set us all free.

Something compelled me forward, and I released my grasp on both Elijah and Jon to skirt around my husband.

“What are you—” Jon’s question shut off at Elijah’s shushing him.

“Her choice, mon coeur .”

I glanced back at Elijah to find his eyes overflowing with love and pride for me stepping forward of my own volition. Heat rushed through me at the memory of warm scales rubbing between my thighs. “I dreamed of your true form countless times since touching you.”

“Then perhaps you are gifted—one drawn by dragonblood,” he murmured, his eyes glinting with blue fire.

Truth.

Strengthened by the inner voice I accepted wholeheartedly, I turned.

Dolyn’s light brown eyes narrowed as they settled on me. Disgust still radiated from his stare but a hint of insecurity as well.

My shaking legs took me toward the man who had set something in motion so profound, so otherworldly that my brain still wanted to argue my new reality.

A quick pinch to the back of my hand promised that I wasn’t dreaming.

Insides fluttering with combined fear and excitement, I shuffled close to the man I’d once chased after through the streets of New York because he had something I wanted but hadn’t known it at the time—the scent of my alpha clinging to him.

Dolyn eyed me warily but didn’t flinch when I lifted my hand.

Both men behind me growled quietly, and I swallowed a giddy snickering that would make me sound like a cackling hyena who’d lost her marbles.

Neither of my lovers made a move to stop me though.

“May I?” I whispered, holding Dolyn’s stare.

He hesitated, a muscle ticking in his jaw.

“Dolyn.” Elijah stated his name quietly but with authority.

The golden god dipped his head in agreement, his face flushed.

Warmth radiated from Dolyn’s chest before I even laid my hand on him.

Heat snaked between the slight distance separating us but not in a sexual manner.

The draw I’d felt so often with others before intensified, and his frown dissipated, eyes widening as though he too recognized the connection between us.

My palm pressed against him—skin to skin.

A flash of absolute recognition swept through my mind, the thing that had always been at the edge of my consciousness whenever coming across a strange one.

I saw Dolyn’s golden dragon with its glowing amber eyes flashing in sunlight.

The spines along his back down to the tip of his tail.

His roar blasting from a massive gaping jaw didn’t fill our cavern or my ears, but I experienced his pain, his anger, his disbelief at what flowed between us.

Other pictures wavered through my mind, settling the underlying continual unrest that the man I touched might still find a way to replace Jon as Elijah’s beta.

That sixth sense I’d hated about myself?

It was the answer to us all finding true contentment.

“Not possible,” I heard Dolyn whisper through the sudden rush of wind in my ears.

I closed my eyes against the feelings my touch invoked in him and radiated back to me, determined to pull the grainy images in my head into better focus.

Another black dragon but smaller, lither than my Elijah—with eyes as brilliant a green as dew-kissed grass.

A tiny dragon with grayish scales and purple-blue eyes...

“Ashley.” I breathed a mere whisper for him alone, my eyelids popping open to land on a disbelieving gaze with swirling pupils. “She is the one you’ve been searching for.”

Dolyn blinked down at me, and I realized he had clasped his huge hand over the back of mine, holding my palm tight against his chest. “I saw her in my mind,” he croaked. “How—how is that possible?”

“She’s mostly human,” I whispered, peering up into his troubled gaze as he fought to believe what I had seen, what our connection had shared with him. His heart beat heavy under my hand, and I held his gaze without fear or unease until his tumbling emotions settled slightly.

He inhaled deeply as though hoping to scent her through my memory. “My female.”

He hadn’t asked a question, but I found myself nodding. “She belongs to you. The other I didn’t recognize.”

His exhale left in a rush. “Nor did I. But the female—how is it you know her?”

“Ashley is Elijah’s secretary.”

“What?” Elijah’s gasped word broke the bond between me and Dolyn, and I turned, my hand dropping from his chest.

Elijah stared at me, eyes wide. “That’s impossible! How could I not have known she is Blood Born?” He breathed the question as though to himself rather than asking me for an explanation.

I tried for a smile, which wobbled at best.

“ Mon coeur ,” he whispered and beckoned to me with his free hand.

Two quick steps and I pressed against his chest, the scent of fire and the warmth of his skin against my cheek settling the riot that had initiated the second I’d lost contact with him.

“You’re so fucking fierce, baby. Goddamn, do I love you.” Jon’s arms wrapped around me from behind, trapping me between my men, settling everything inside me.

Home .

I breathed a heavy sigh at the quiet whisper, so overwhelmed that my eyes stung.

“Ashley O’Connor,” Elijah said, his low voice rumbling beneath my ear. “She’s an absent-minded, timid little thing—much more fragile than the female humans we used to share, Dolyn. Don’t hurt her.”

The command from my alpha rang out with a finality that promised retribution if ignored.

“I—I’m sorry, Elijah,” Dolyn murmured, his own heartache once more reaching to caress my mind, but a sliver of hope had seemed to ease his pain.

“I apologize for abandoning you without a word even if my intentions had been pure. I—I thought I was doing right in leaving, hoping to locate what we were both so desperate to have.”

Sorry I wasn’t enough , I felt sure Dolyn wanted to add.

I turned my face from where I’d burrowed against Elijah’s chest in order to connect with Dolyn’s eyes.

Emotion poured from him, complete conflicting chaos.

“Go to her,” I whispered, smiling through the tears hazing my vision, “and find your alpha mate together.”

“You mean our beta,” he corrected me—but I wasn’t so sure he spoke truth.

“A gifted one of the ancient blood has revealed your destined mates,” Elijah assured him while squeezing me tight. “Do as she says and claim them as fate intended.”

Dolyn’s gaze roamed over the three of us pressed together as Jon nuzzled against my hair.

Lips pursed, Dolyn nodded and spun. I buried my face once more in Elijah’s chest. He didn’t speak, but the slider opened and closed with finality.

Elijah’s chest heaved a heavy exhale. “Are you all right?” he murmured.

I nodded, eyes clenched shut.

“The fuck is he doing?” Jon asked, releasing his hold on us. He took a step forward, and I turned from Elijah, my gaze following my husband’s toward the massive windows overlooking the veranda.

Dolyn’s stood on the edge, his back covered in rippling muscle and tattoos. He glanced over his shoulder and dipped his head even though he couldn’t see through the one-way glass.

He threw himself off the edge

I shrieked, clutching at Elijah’s arm.

“Fuck!” Jon took a quick step forward, but Elijah grabbed his wrist.

“Wait, mon coeur .”

A golden, scaled body shot upward, disappearing within a heartbeat as though becoming one with the blue of the sky.

Jon jolted back, bumping against Elijah’s shoulder. “Holy fucking hell!”

A hysterical gasped giggle burst from me. “Somebody else pinch me. Please—this can’t be real!”

“I would rather love you—both of you—if you’ll have me?”

Elijah’s murmured confession tore my focus off the window. The vulnerability in his stare stilled the giddiness, begged me to accept the gift of his heart, and made my eyes burn. I laced my fingers through his, clutching tight.

Jon ran his hands through his hair and mumbled beneath his breath. “Think you better fucking pinch me .”

“I owe you both an apology and an explanation,” Elijah said rather than pushing us for an answer. His pale eyes revealed the guilt and hope for forgiveness I felt trickling through our bound hands. “I withheld the truth from you.”

“For good reason,” Jon muttered, crossing his arms over his chest in a show of insecurity I hadn’t expected considering all that had happened.

“If you told us the truth when we first met you, I’d have dragged Dakota away before the damn magic of this place pinned us down like I did her body every other hour of every day we’ve spent here. ”

Need kindled between my thighs, and I swallowed hard against the rush of saliva flooding my mouth.

“While my scent’s pheromones linger inside these walls, there’s no enchantment over our home,” Elijah said with a soft chuckle as though well aware of my arousal, “but the connection between our souls that fate intended— that can’t be put aside as anything but magical.”

The two men stared at each other, and I shivered over the growing tension. Energy slid over my skin but with a complete lack of anger or hurt.

Elijah squeezed my fingers and held his other hand out toward Jon. “Will you...” He swallowed as though unsure if my husband’s submission freely given before Dolyn’s arrival was still on offer.

Jon didn’t hesitate to move close and grasped Elijah’s hand, sending a shuddering sigh through our lover.

“I didn’t lie to Dolyn about who you are to us, Elijah.

” My husband peered into our alpha’s eyes, the truth of his words shimmering through the energy connecting the three of us.

“I love you—have for a while, just didn’t have the fucking balls to admit it. ”

Elijah’s throat bobbed, and a sweet ache swept over me.

“Same,” I managed to whisper past the thickness in my throat. “So much.”

Without a word, we stepped in toward one another, closing the circle. As though of the same mind, we pressed inward, the men leaning down enough for all our foreheads to touch. “You are mine,” Elijah whispered, his voice ragged, “and I am yours.”

“Yes,” both Jon and I said at the same time—a decision that didn’t need thought but came straight from our hearts.

Whispers poured from Elijah’s lips, words I couldn’t comprehend but ones that resonated deep inside my soul. I gasped as flames licked up along our legs. Flames without heat, blue and beautiful, flickering, reaching upward as Elijah continued to speak, surrounding us with his love.